History
by morph
Summary: The TARDIS' POV during 'Time Crash' and the beginning of 'Voyage of the Damned.' Part of my TARDIS 100 series. One shot.


AN/ This is a fic I started to write early last year, but I needed the subtitles from the DVD to finish it. Darn the 10th Doctor and his rapid, impossible speech! Takes place during 'Time Crash' and the beginning of 'Voyage of the Damned.' TARDIS POV. Part of my TARDIS 100 series. The BBC owns all. Please let me know if you like it and if you can spot any mistakes.

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Martha Jones exited through my doors again and my Doctor and I found ourselves alone… empty. When a companion leaves, they always leave a gap. I like to think that gap needs to be filled, even if the Doctor tries to convince himself otherwise. Even though we both had the strong suspicion that we'd see Martha again in the not too far future of our own personal timelines, we were still stuck with the problem of what we should do in the meantime.

I noticed that the Doctor had neglected to put my shields up. An idea blossomed, an event that I remembered from long, long ago. It would be painful for me, but in the end, it would cheer my Doctor up somewhat, and now was the only time I could do it, so I went for it.

I contacted his mind. _"My Doctor… do you remember… from your fifth regeneration… the black hole and the supernova that happened at the exact same time_?"

He paused and answered me. _"…Yes, I do. Why do you ask?"_

"_Just… hold on."_

And with that, I collided and merged with another TARDIS. It wasn't just any TARDIS though, because there _are_ no other TARDISes out there. Just me. I met and merged with my past self. An alarm sounded as I rolled crazily through the Vortex, momentarily out of control. The Doctor was knocked off his feet and into the cushioned seat. I suddenly found two TARDIS minds waring in my heart. It ached and I fought. It was like having a multiple personality disorder. My past self was slightly weaker. The Time War and other battles had made me strong. I embraced her and pushed her down, holding her steady while maintaining my interior appearance and bringing the Time Lord she carried into me.

The Doctor was unaware of my struggle at first. He was angry and scolded me for knocking him about with so little warning. He flicked switches, bringing me under control once again. "_Stop it_!" The Doctor was also unaware of the fact that he had company. My Doctor, in his tenth regeneration, was about to meet my Doctor in his fifth.

"What was that all about, eh?" The tenth Doctor wrapped his knuckles against the base of my Time Rotor, breathing hard, slowing his hearts. I couldn't answer him as I battled with my doppelganger, but I knew he would figure it out soon enough. "Eh? What's your problem?"

As he started to move around my controls to check some readings, he bumped into another man wearing pale cricket gear. He was rambling, his mind connected to the other TARDIS is my heart. "Right, just settle down now," he said. The other TARDIS cried out to him.

The two men apologized for bumping into each other and passed, before both of them stopped, realising. The tenth Doctor recognised this man instantly, but he was not recognised in return. Both were shocked and surprised to find the other in what they thought of as his TARDIS.

"_What_?" the Doctor said.

"_What_?" the other echoed. They faced each other, staring into each other's eyes, trying to get over the shock.

"_What_?" the tenth Doctor asked again.

"Who are you?" the fifth Doctor demanded.

Realisation dawned on Ten and he grinned slowly. His mind started to bounce, and I knew that it was only a matter of time before his words followed suit. "Oh, brilliant! I mean, totally wrong, big emergency, universe goes 'bang' in five minutes, but… _brilliant_!" He looked Five up and down, but Five wasn't happy.

"I'm the Doctor. Who are you?" he demanded.

Ten's grin would not fade. "Yes, you are! You are the Doctor!"

"_Yes_, I am. I'm the Doctor."

"Oh, good for you, Doctor! Good for brilliant, old you!" Ten was caught up in his memories, his personal history. It was all coming back, all those old adventures, his old life, before the Time War.

"Is there something wrong with you?" Five asked, frowning.

Ten's delight only grew at the expression. "Oh! There it goes! The frowny face! I remember that one! Mind you…" He gave Five's face a closer study, putting his hands to his cheeks and pushing the skin around, much to Five's displeasure. "Bit saggier than I ought to be. Hair's a bit greyer." He fuzzed a side burn and turned away briefly to flick some controls. Five touched his face. "That's 'cause of me though. Two of us together's shortened out the time differential. It should all snap back into place when we get you home."

Ten tugged on Five's jacket, remembering the feel of the cloth. He could barely get the excited words out of his mouth fast enough. "Be able to close that coat again! But never mind that! Look at you! The hat, the coat, the cricketity-cricket stuff, the… stick of celery. Yeah…" More memories flitted through his mind. His companions asking about the celery and the half-truth he told them. "Brave choice, celery, but fair play to you. Not many men can carry off a decorative vegetable."

"_Shut up_!" Five snapped. Ten obliged. Five whipped off his trademark hat. "There is something very wrong with my TARDIS and I've got to do something about it very, very quickly, and it _would_ help, it really would help if there wasn't some _skinny idiot _ranting in my face about _every single thing _that happens to be in_ front _of him!"

I sighed, the pain of warring with myself starting to tire me out. I thanked Five for remembering me.

"Oh okay. Sorry, Doctor," Ten said, still finding some amusement in addressing himself.

"Thank you." Five turned and placed his hat on one of the few empty spaces on my controls . Before he could get to work figuring out what had happened though, Ten had bounced back at it, grinning and almost leaning over Five's back.

"Oh! The back of our head!"

"What?"

"Sorry, sorry, it's not something you see every day is it? The back of your own head. Mind you… I can see why you wear a hat. I don't want to seem vain, but could you keep that on?"

Five turned to face him once again, flummoxed. "What have you done to my TARDIS?" He looked around at my interior. Ten just leaned against my console, watching him and ginning. He also gazed around. "You've changed the desktop feed, haven't you? What's this one? Coral?!" Ten shrugged, rather fond of it despite Five's frustration. "It's worse than the leopard skin." Five glared at Ten and put on his glasses. Ten didn't let him get back to work, bounding with enthusiasm once again.

"Oh! Out they come! The brainy specks!" He laughed and rocked from one foot to another. "You don't even need them. You just think they make you look a bit clever."

The struggle with sharing my heart was starting to tire me out, but I fought on for the sake of my Doctors. Even still, I had to sound an alarm. Time was running out. Five heard the alarm before he could respond to Ten. He took off his glasses and looked around. "That's an alert!" He dashed to the controls. Ten followed him on the other side of my console. "Level five. Indicating a temporal collision." Five could hear his TARDIS, the old me, crying out in his mind. I was also contacting him, so he could hear us both at the same time. It perplexed him. "It's like two TARDISes have _merged_, but… there's definitely only one TARDIS present."

Ten calmly walked over to my video screen. He remembered all this, and let his older self work it out. He leaned against my controls, draping an arm across the top of the screen. He knew I was in pain too.

"_You'll be okay, Old Girl. Both of you. Hang in there," _he thought.

"It's like there's two time zones at war in the heart of the TARDIS," Five continued, sounding confused and worried. "That's a paradox," he realised fearfully. I allowed myself a mental sigh. Just when I thought I'd had enough of paradoxes, I had to throw myself into another one. "It could blow a hole in the space- time continuum the size of…"

Ten turned the screen towards Five. I buzzed and trilled. A quick scan of the readings I was giving him allowed him to finish his sentence. "Well, actually the exact size of… Belgium." He sighed and looked at Ten. "That's a bit undramatic, isn't it? Belgium?"

Ten calmly took his sonic screwdriver out of the interior pocket of his blue suit jacket and offered it to Five. "You need this?"

"No, I'm fine."

"Oh no, of course, you mostly went hands-fee, didn't you?" Ten remembered. He flipped the sonic screwdriver and replaced in in his pocket. "Like, 'hey, I'm the Doctor. I can save the whole universe using a kettle and some string, and look at me, I'm wearing a vegetable!'"

Five had had enough. He stood almost nose-to nose with Ten, staring into his eyes. "Who are you?" he demanded to know again.

This time, Ten continued with his calm tone, serious now. "Take a look."

Realisation dawned on Five's face. "Oh. Oh, no…"

"Oh, yes." Ten nodded, assuming they were on the same page at last.

"Oh, no… you're…"

Ten was amused now. "Here it comes. Yeah, yeah, I am..."

"A fan," Five finished, still displeased as ever. He went back to the controls, leaving Ten to stumble his words in surprise.

"Yeah… _what_?!"

I would have laughed had I not been in such strife. A different alarm began to beep.

"Level ten now. This is bad! Two minutes till Belgium!" Five said, his fingers working my controls.

Ten came around the other side, annoyed by Five now. "What do you mean, 'fan'?! I'm not just a fan, I'm _you_!"

Five waved a hand at him, still too busy to get what Ten was saying. "Okay, you're my biggest fan." He stood before him again. "Look, it's perfectly understandable. I go zooming around space and time, saving planets, fighting monsters and being, well, let's be honest, pretty sort of marvellous." Ten nodded, acknowledging that. It was a tradition that he was glad to continue. "So naturally every now and then, people notice me. Start up their little groups… like that L.I.N.D.A. lot." Five suddenly frowned at Ten and looked slight horrified. "Are you one of them?"

Ten and I remembered L.I.N.D.A.… shame about the Absorbaloff. Ten didn't answer Five, still waiting for him to figure it out.

Five assumed that Ten was with Elton and Ursula's group. "How did you get in here?! Can't have you lot knowing where I live!"

"Listen to me! I'm you!" Ten insisted. He patted his cheeks. "I'm you with a new face. Check out this bone structure, Doctor, 'cos one day, you're going to be shaving it."

I couldn't take the pain much longer. The black hole my paradox was creating was getting closer. I sounded by Cloister Bell, only used in sure dire emergencies.

Again, Five's reply was cut off. Both their eyes turned upwards and slight dread filled the air. "The Cloister Bell," Five whispered.

It was the moment Ten had been waiting for. He leapt into action. "Yeah, right on time. That's my cue!"

Five was near-panicked, frantically working his side of my controls opposite Ten. He fumbled, not familiar with the changes to my controls since my old days with him. "In less than a minute, we're going to create a black whole strong enough to swallow the entire universe!"

Ten paused. "Yeah… that's my fault, actually. I was re-building the TARDIS, forgot to put the shields back up." He gestured with his thumb over his shoulder. Five paused to listen to him, shocked. "Your TARDIS and my TARDIS, well, the same TARDIS, at different voyages in the same time stream and collided. Blugh! There you go, end of the universe, butterfingers! But don't worry! I know exactly how all this works out. Watch!"

Five watched in amazement and Ten confidently worked my controls, steering me in the expert way that only he can.

"Venting the thermo-buffer. Roaring the Helmic Regulator! And just to finish off…" he typed frantically at my keyboard, "… let's fry those Ziton crystals."

Five grabbed Ten's arm to stop him. "You'll blow up the TARDIS!"

"Only way out," Ten said.

"Who told you that?"

"_You_ told me that!" With that, Ten hit the switch.

There was an internal explosion and a brilliant flash of light. The tensions and pain I was feeling instantly began to ease. Both of the Doctors were save, and the universe remained intact.

"Super nova and black hole at the _exact same _instant," Five said, realising what had just happened.

"Explosion cancels out implosion," Ten added.

"Mater remains constant."

Ten looked at Five. "Brilliant."

"Far too brilliant." Five met his gaze, impressed and finally starting to settle on the fact that Ten was him from the future. "I've never met anyone else who could fly the TARDIS like that."

"Sorry mate, you still haven't." Ten moved away and Five followed, filled with relief and excitement.

"You didn't have time to work that all out! Even _I_ couldn't do it!"

Ten looked at him and spoke softly. "I didn't work it out. I didn't have to."

"You remembered," Five realised. I reached out and touched his mind softly, remembering how it felt fondly.

"Because you _will_ remember," Ten said.

"You remembered being me, watching you doing that." Five looked back at the controls where Ten had worked his magic. "You only knew what to do because… I saw you do it."

Ten nodded, smiling. "Wibbily-wobbly…"

"Timey-wimey!" they said together, grinning.

Ten went to give five a high-five, but the past doctor didn't return it. Ten's grin faded somewhat.

I felt the other TARDIS begin to pull away, and I was glad to let her go. I made a sound to alert the Doctors of this. Ten leapt back into action, flicking switches and pressing buttons, all energy once again. Five only stood and watched him, still in slight awe.

"_Is that what I'm really going to be like?" _he wondered. _"Oh dear."_

I laughed slightly in his mind. _"Don't worry. It's not for another five regenerations."_

"Sorry, Doctor, time's up! Back to long ago!" Ten paused and looked at his past self. The door in his mind to the memories of his fifth self was well and truly open. "Where are you now? Nyssa and Tegan? Cybermen and Mara and Time Lords in funny hats and the Master - oh! He just showed up again! Same as ever." He moved to another part of my controls. I hissed in his mind, requesting that he not mention the Master again for a long, long time.

"Oh no, really?" Five asked. He sighed. "Does he still have that rubbish beard?"

"No, no beard this time, _well_, a wife."

The fifth Doctor started to fade as his TARDIS separated herself further from my heart. "Oh, I seem to be off," Five's voice echoed. He gazed upon Ten now not with confusion or frustration, but admiration. It felt good to him to know what he'd make it that far, and he was grateful for the chance to meet his future self, even if it almost ended in disaster.

"_What about the other Time Lords, or his/my companions…. Where is everyone?" _Five asked me.

Of course… Five would have able to tell in that telepathic way all Time Lords can the presence of others of their own kind. Since the Time War, their echoes had been silent.

"_We are between companions right now…" _I explained. _"The rest… I cannot tell you. Just please promise me you will give my Doctor happy memoires during these dark times."_

"_I will do my best."_

"What can I say?" Five said allowed to his future self. "Thank you, Doctor."

The tenth Doctor stood with his hand resting against a coral part of my controls, watching Five sadly. His grief at losing Martha was almost forgotten. Despite this, he found himself wishing she were there, or Rose, just so they could meet his past self. He nodded to Five. "Thank you."

"I'm very welcome." Five smiled and faded completely for a moment, but Ten wasn't ready to let him go just yet. He quickly pressed a switch and Five re-appeared. He didn't look surprised to be back. Besides, he'd forgotten his hat. Ten picked it up.

"You know…" he handed Five the hat and smiled fondly. "I love being you. Back when I first started at the very beginning, I was always trying to be old and grumpy and important like you do when you're young… and then I was you. And it was all dashing about and playing cricket and my voice going all squeaky when I shouted. I still do that! The voice thing! I got that from you!"

Five's smile widened and he put on his hat.

"Oh, and…" Ten momentarily propped a foot up on my console to show off his bright red shoe. "…the trainers, _and_…" he got his own glasses out of his pocket and put them on, still grinning. "Snap." The grin faded, but not the affection in Ten's voice. "'Cos you know what, Doctor? You were _my_ Doctor."

Five was so proud, even though he knew it was time to go. He tipped his hat. "To days to come."

"All my love to long ago," Ten replied.

Five faded again and Ten smirked, nostalgic. His hearts here warmed by this visit from our past.

"_Thank you, Old Girl. I needed that. Sorry for the stress it caused you."_

"_You'll make it up to me, I'm sure." _

My Doctor took off his glasses just as Five's voice echoed throughout the room once again. "Oh, Doctor! Remember to put your shields up!"

Ten pressed a button to make me fly away, and didn't react to Five's warning in time. A ship's horn bellowed and there was a sudden, tremendous pain as the bow of the vessel crashed through my wall. The Doctor was thrown to the floor, only just catching himself between the console and the seat. I hissed and whimpered in his mind as this new pain wracked my frame. Dust rained down around the Doctor, who stared up at the invading ship in shock. I was only glad he didn't get hit by and debris.

"What!? What?!" He couched and crawler to a life-ring from the ship that had landed on my floor. He flipped it over and read 'Titanic' written in big, black letters across it. The ship's bell clanged over his head. He looked up at the ship again, very unamused. "_What_?"

"_Doctor! Help me!" _I cried in his mind.

"_Shh… you'll be okay. I've got you."_ He got to his feet and twisted a knob on my controls, looking over his shoulder at the ship. Then he moved to another part, shifted some of the dust and another life ring out of the way, and started to wind back a revolving handle, watching the grey hull of the _Titanic_ anxiously. Slowly at first, then fast and faster, I backed up, my freshly-applied shields pushing the ship out of my side and repairing the damage. I was instantly flooded with relief.

The Doctor's next move was to land me on that ship. He needed to know what happened, and if it really was the _Titanic_.

"_Better now?" _he asked me.

"_Yes. Thank you.."_

"_No problem. Now I need to find out about that ship. This can't be the 1914 _Titanic_ because one, it's not the same colour, two, the _Titanic_ didn't have 'Titanic' written on her life rings, and three, last time I checked, we weren't adrift in the North Atlantic Ocean."_

The landing, like so many others, was a very tight one, but I managed it with ease. The Doctor poked his head out the door and looked around. It certainly looked and sounded like the interior of a cruise liner out there. He checked my side where the ship had pierced my wall, but there was no mark on my blue-painted wooden hide. He gave my side a pat.

"_Good, sturdy Old Girl," _he thought. _"I'm going to so see what's up. I'll be back soon."_

"_Yes, go. Do what you do best. I'll be waiting, as always."_

"_Good."_

And with that, he stepped out, closed my doors, wiped some more dust off his shoulder, and started a new adventure.


End file.
